


Just a Smile at the End

by Lt_Kickbutt



Category: RWBY
Genre: Angst, Drinking, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, MonCon April Submission, Pre-Canon, Storytelling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-04
Updated: 2016-04-04
Packaged: 2018-05-31 04:08:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6455047
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lt_Kickbutt/pseuds/Lt_Kickbutt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>My submission for RWBY subreddit's MonCon in April.  The Character is Qrow and the Theme is Story telling.</p>
<p> <br/>Here is a link to the page and to vote. Read and vote for your favorite! </p>
<p>https://www.reddit.com/r/RWBY/comments/4gaw9m/official_rrwby_moncon_april_2016_voting/</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Qrow visits Summer's grave for the first time. Voting is now up at the link!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just a Smile at the End

**Author's Note:**

> My first attempt at writing for a competition. I know it is really early into April but this month is going to be crazy for me so when I saw this I decided to bang it out in a weekend.
> 
> I have a feeling that quite a few people are going to go heavy angst with this topic, so if you're trying to slog through a bunch of tear jerkers I apologize, this is short. I hope there are some interesting ideas worth your time.
> 
> My goal was to pack a bunch of emotion really concisely, I hope it has enough "storytelling" to warrant submission, but that's for the voters to decide!
> 
> If you are interested in what I am talking about, competing, or voting yourself the link will take you to the rules. 
> 
> https://www.reddit.com/r/RWBY/comments/4d3tgb/official_rrwby_moncon_april_2016/

The shattered moon of Remnant hung low overhead the chilly cliff. Oak trees in the forest groaned against the wind as their leaves shook off sacrificing themselves to the approaching winter. A silhouette of a man leaned alongside his tall scythe stood in front of a small gravestone.  Shaded black against the light of the moon like the ghostly reaper himself Qrow Branwen came to ferry his respects to his fallen teammate into the afterlife. Qrow sat down next to the grave with his legs crossed and scythe slung across his shoulders.

He carefully traced the letters of her grave recalling every moment they touched, from grazed fingers, to brushing away locks of hair, and an infinite amount more of warmth against warmth. The stone lacked her warmth, but it still wanted to listen. She had waited on that cliff for a story, an excuse, a eulogy, anything. A full year in the making, Summer’s beloved teammate Qrow opened his mouth to speak.

“Hey Shortie, it’s a nice looking spot you have here. And the rock! It’s…it’s done right. I was hoping when I saw it for the first time it would be with better news. Well, just making it home would be good enough news, but not enough for justice.”

A furious wind gust caught Qrow by surprise as he had to clutch his scythe to keep it from flying away. Running his fingers through his hair he continued softly, “I saw her Summer. Ozpin and I both saw her, and she told us that she killed you. Your last words were mentioned, but now that I think about it, I can’t remember passed my rage.”

Qrow’s nostrils flared as he swallowed hard, “We tried to stop her, tried to bring her in or kill her. She is…strong now. We got away but now the plan has changed, grooming a whole new generation of maidens, Ozpin asked me to train them alongside him and Glynda. It seems all I’m good for is fighting…”

Qrow shivered violently as his breath hurried. He understood that holding back tears, alone, at a grave was pointless but once he gave into crying he would struggle with his story. His chest puffed up and down in large exhales as he admitted his greatest shame, “That was six months ago.”

He clutched his flask but held it there, unable to disappoint Summer twice without explaining. “I have been home, these last months, with Tai, Yang, and Ruby. I didn’t even try to come.” Qrow wiped the tears off his eyes, “I…I was certain we would find her trail again, get another chance to avenge you. I couldn’t…not here…not before I avenged you.”

“Of course they asked me if I’ve been, and of course they asked me if I would join them. I would lie, turn them down, tell them how I thought the spot is beautiful and you’d be happy with the view. It got easier and in time they stopped asking.”

“Yang and Ruby are the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen.” Qrow’s whimpering turned into a forced smile as he exhaled a laugh, “Yang does this smug, little thing, and I don’t know where she got it. She crosses her arms and juts out her hip with a smirk, like a real tough girl. She does it to me on purpose now because I don’t like it and I’ll scoop her up in my arms and noogie my fist into that mane she calls a head of hair.” Qrow ground his fist into his open palm with a smirk, “You should see her hair now. She absolutely _refuses_ to get it cut. When Tai questioned her she said,” Voice quivering his way through the next sentence, “‘Mom always told me how much she loved my hair.’”

Soft tears rolled down Qrow’s cheeks but his laughter helped him talk through them, “I don’t think she’s ever going to get it cut.” Qrow’s face dropped into a frown as he stared at his calloused hands, “I try…I try to comb it for her, like you used to, but my hands won’t stop shaking. Poor Yang, I tug on her knots and when I pull out strands of her coveted golden hair my heart breaks. She gets so upset she puffs out her cheeks, her hair stands on end, and she burns like a charcoal briquette.”

“Hopefully one day she’ll let me comb through it and not mind the knots.”

“And Ruby, your baby girl. She’s gotten so big! And Yang reads her stories and lullabies at night, but Ruby is so smart she’s starting to read on her own. And…and…and” Qrow burst into tears, leaning over the grave with his arms cradling around it. He pressed his head against the cold stone rose in the center and continued to press harder and harder until his forehead throbbed a bright red. Tears fell off his eyes and the end of his nose onto his beloved Summer as the words came out between sobs.

“And she still smells just like her mother. I can still smell the smell of your skin on her after she gets out of the bath. I know it’s you. It surrounds that girl like a faint aura, greater than any huntsman’s, mixed with all the other smells she’ll struggle to remember. I don’t ever want that to go away, I want her to grow into a woman with her mother at her fingertips, but it just gets fainter all the time.”

“I tried to get close, greedily wanting to smell you again, but a minute with me means a minute less with you and I can’t do that to her right now. I’ve been avoiding her, going on missions and spending entire days out of the house. And when I do show up I smell of whiskey and everything I touch smells of whiskey which makes me more upset.”

Qrow lifted his head wide eyed as he stared at the grave, without a word he pulled out his flask and dropped it on her grave.  A water logged clank echoed off her grave and the flask fell to the ground.

“I’m sorry…You worked so hard to get me to quit. Tai lets me have it every time he sees this thing. He means well. The day I returned he embraced me with one hand and slugged my jaw with the other. I am not so conflicted.” Qrow picked up his flask and swigged from the top, “I failed you Summer.”

“I let you die. Then I insulted you again, leaving you to wait for an entire year. In the meantime the liquor beat you out as I march to join you. It doesn’t matter to me if I drink myself to death or off in the wild on a mission from Ozpin, I just hope to see you when the other scythe wielder comes to collect.

Qrow rolled off of Summer’s grave back onto his rear. As he drank again the neck of his flask calmed his shame into a haze of sorrowed numbness. “Ruby and Yang both want to be huntress still. You gave them the dream, and did a good job of teaching them to care for others.” Qrow took another hit of his flask before continuing to himself, “What a terrible barter to be made. They will be great huntress, I will make sure myself. They may even save the world more times than you did, but the trade cost them their mother.”

Qrow shook his flask listening to the empty spaces as he smiled sincerely for the first time tonight, “Remember how many times I insisted we have a drink together? I know you always said no,” A teary eyed chuckle escaped from his lips, “or ‘half-a-one’ when you felt bad and wanted to humor me, but tonight I thought I might insist just one more time.” Qrow tilted his flask to the side and as slowly as possible poured his whisky onto Summer’s grave.

The liquor sparkled in the moonlight each sparkle like a memory between friends. Qrow could see the team’s first mission, graduation day, being best man at her wedding. As he tilted the flask higher and higher the realization haunted him. The flask is nearly empty, he begged for just a few drops more, just a moment longer, one more memory between them. So many moments left half finished. Could he have asked one more time? Could he have said something different? What if he had just kissed her? Their story poured out incomplete on the final resting place of the last woman who mattered in his life.

The worth of an unfinished story drove Qrow’s hands to shake as he threw the flask off the edge of the cliff, unable to hear it land from the hiss of the wind. “I’m sorry!” He screamed into the air as he wept again, “I can come back now! I can come back every day if you ask! Tell me and I’ll cleave Remnant in two! Just to hear you whisper the answers.”

Qrow fell silent waiting for an answer in the wind. Something he could imagine to be Summer. He waited for an hour with his ear against the stone before his grief was satisfied. Rising to his feet he collected his scythe, “I like to imagine when the reaper came for you his scythe looked like mine, and you’d smile because when he offered you his hand it reminded you of me.”

**Author's Note:**

> Something I really value is getting to know the writer on a work I really like, so if anyone is so interested I will answer any questions about the work, what I like on RWBY, RL life even maybe. Just ask! Don't let comments influence your vote though, just on the merits of the story.
> 
> Criticism and comments always welcome! Was 1600 words enough to make it meaningful?
> 
> Edit: I am going to be linking any fellow competitors who use Ao3 here in a reading list type thing. If you want to read and vote voting opens at the end of the month. The link in the summary leads to a reddit thread where the top comment will have all the competing fictions.
> 
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/6456724 Mist (Night's Watch One-Shot) by checkerchairs.


End file.
